A proportional hazard model was used to analyze the impact of the most important factors on the length of productive life of 44796 Slovak Pinzgau cows. The calculations were carried out with Survival Kit 3.12. The most important factor was the milk production level within herd. Cows with extremely low milk production (less than 1.5 standard deviations below average) had a 4.8 times higher culling risk than average cows. The culling risk for highest yielding cows was about one half of the risk of averagecows. In the first lactation the culling risk was highest at the beginning and decreased in the course of the lactation whereas in the subsequent lactations the culling risk was highest at the end of the lactation. The risk decreased with parity. Cows from expanding herds were at lower risk to be culled compared to cows in herds of stable and decreasing size.